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11 year old son with high functioning autism

NAS73480

Hello everyone. I need some help please as we are at a loss.

My son had a good, enjoyable time at school up until last year. He was hard work at home but teachers always reassured us that he was a good student and very popular. 18 months ago he lost it and refused to go to school and to cut a long painful story short he is diagnosed with adhd (on medication) and high functioning autism. We moved him to a small friendly school and he was unable to cope. We have started online learning and he is now refusing to do even 2 hours a day. He says his body won't let him and starts shaking. I don't think this is an act but would be interested to know if any other parents are struggling with getting their child to learn. We are struggling to understand the difference between can't and won't!

Should we back off and let him play on his games all day or keep trying and continue with the high amount of stress on the family.

Any advice is greatly appreciated.

  • Our daughter is 11 as well. She is in mainstream school but very small  and helpful. Till last year she was enjoying school, now very often she refused to go. It is hard when I have to take her to the car and deal with huge meltdown while I’m driving. Often she says CAN’T to different thinks. And she is not able to say why. Just can’t and saying “mummy I don’t know, I just can’t”. School and educational psychologist said alongside with autism she is having PDA (pathological demand avoidance). Which is literally when your brain saying you cannot do something, then is trying to avoid and if it’s no excuses anymore then attach panic which often finishes with aggression or huge meltdown. I read a lot, asked questions and the best way we worked out is to give a choice for example “would you like to go this way or that way to school?” “Do you want go 5 minutes earlier to play on school playground or on time and straight go to class?” “If you not feeling well would you like go through office or class door today?” Most of the times it is work. As brain does not see demand only choice which is given. 

  • Problems like this don’t generally come out of nowhere all of a sudden. Either there was a very powerful trigger that set this school aversion off or it was bubbling away for a long time and his teachers just weren’t seeing it. Either way what you need to do is get your son to communicate with you and tell you exactly why it was he grew to hate his last school and now hates this one too.

    i think initially you need to move the focus from how to make him do these things into getting him to explain why he doesn’t want to.

    in my view the shaking is more likely to be a reaction to anxiety surrounding school and work than any kind of overstimulation. But you need to have him articulate exactly how that works.

    i mean I’m no expert on adhd but I imagine if you have a condition that fills your body with nervous energy and then you are told you have to sit still for an hour that itself could cause some anxiety.

    Maybe you need a teaching style that allows him to fidget. Move around. Go between sitting and standing.

    instead of a seat and table why not hook the computer upto the tv and allow him to move around the living room as he goes through lessons?

  • Won'ts are often for the autistc person's safety, they know what's good and what's bad for them. Once they've been taught one way to learn autism can make them struggle to take an alternative approach. 

    If he has oversensitivity the computer may be overstimulating him, overstimulation leads to coping reactions or closing off. The shaking is certainly a reaction, something about online learning he may find overwhelming.

    Sometimes it's not a matter of what they learn, it matters more how they learn.